Dan Harmon Had a Progressive Conversation With Himself About Equality in His Reddit AMA

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Earlier today, writer and showrunner Dan Harmon participated in an Ask Me Anything on Reddit, and it was populated mostly by Harmon fans asking for the inside scoop on Rick and Morty and Community. (He doesn’t know anything about the movie and he’s sorry.) But one Redditor going by the handle MaddoxJKingsly decided to give Harmon a little extra room to run, asking the question, “What’s something you’ve always wanted to be asked during a Q&A, and what would your response be?” And since Dan Harmon is the kind of guy who would put out a 30-minute episode of comedic television called “Remedial Chaos Theory,” he proceeded to ask and answer a series of questions about equality for women, people of color, and members of the LGBT community. For the purposes of Harmon’s conversation with himself, “Kevin” was the one asking the questions, and it went like this.

Q: “Dan, it seems like people tend to assume you’re sexist because you don’t shower and have that oppositional defiant disorder edginess that often comes with closet chauvinism among comedy writers, but is it true you’re, like, super pro-actively invested in the obliteration of the entertainment industry’s glass ceiling?”

A: I’m glad you asked that, Kevin, but you see, even with that question, we’re already slipping into progress’ biggest impedance within the male worldview which is the unspoken characterization of feminism as some kind of charity or favor. While pro-active steps need to be taken for any effective change to occur, in my opinion, my taking of those steps has never been me “doing right” by someone else. I’ve only followed my own inner sense of correctness in seeking out the most talented writers of any biological composition on the planet Earth and obliterating the obstacles between them and the achievement of their dreams.

Kevin eventually got a little ahead of himself and stopped using the proper AMA question-and-answer format, but Harmon, being the thoughtful sort that he is, was patient with the curious avatar of his inner monologue. “Kevin, calm down,” Harmon said. “We’re not going to become better people by punishing each other’s ignorance, it’s okay for you to be a flawed person. The answer to your question is yes, a thousand times yes, I am an advocate of literally everything it’s possible to advocate and you can look that up, there’s a paper trail, not that that’s what this is about.” We would like to thank Kevin for making such good use of the Reddit AMA space. We could use more folks like Kevin who are willing to ask celebrities the real, tough questions. You can read the rest of Harmon’s exchange with Kevin here.